The Death of Rob Winslow

The Death of Rob Winslow





When I was a kid my Aunt and Uncle, Argie and Bessie Bates lived with my Mother and I. My daddy was fighting a war in Burma, he had been gone for a year, and the war was just begun. Mama was sad a lot of the time. Argie and Bessie were a great comfort to her. Uncle Argie took care of the farm, and the livestock. We had about fifty mother cows some horses, chickens and a couple of pigs. We put up a lotta hay in the summer. I got to feed the chickens, and help with haying the cows.

Argie Bates was tall and thin, he had deep lines in his face, from working outside, his complexion was tan and leathery, his jaw was square, and he had beautiful clear blue eyes. His hands were big and callus from working hard on the farm, his voice was deep and rich, but soft and gentle. A gray mustache covered his upper lip, and a watch chain hung out of the bib on his overalls. He had sandy brown hair, and usually wore a straw hat and boots.

Aunt Bessie's complexion was dark, showing her Choctaw Indian roots. She was a little overweight, with raven black hair and black eyes that spit fire when angered. She looked every bit the part of an Indian squaw, but had the manners of a refined lady. Her Father and Mother had been very wealthy, so she attended the best schools, and was highly educated.

My Mama was lovely her curly auburn hair surrounded her beautiful face. She had pale white skin that was spattered with freckles, witch added to her beauty. A small woman, about one hundred and five pounds and five foot one, with the greenest eyes in the world. She was quick to anger and quicker to forgive. Her Irish temper kept a young man's tongue in check. Mama's name was Heloise. Mama was a beautiful lady. Being raised in Dallas she too was refined, and well respected by everyone.

My name is David. There isn't much to tell about me, I was a very average young man. I missed my daddy a lot. Argie let me go with him to do chores, I was a constant companion, but Argie never seemed to mind. I asked a million questions, and Argie, with his deep gentle voice would answer them all. Uncle Argie taught me how to work and the value of a dollar.

We lived on top of a hill Mama called it Rock Hill, in an old five or six bedroom house. It had been built in the late eighteen hundreds, and There were many stories told about that old house. We never went up stairs after dark. The old house made a lot of strange noise at night. Sometimes you could hear voices coming from up stairs. You couldn't understand them it was like two people talking far away. Mama and Bessie said that things would be moved or float across the room. I was sitting at the kitchen table doing my homework, when the table began to rise off the floor. I was so scared, I ran to Mama, crying. We stood there watching the table rise about a foot of the floor, make a complete 360, then sit back down. I wouldn't go back to the table to finish my homework. There were many instances like that it always scared me. There was something going to get me and I couldn't see it!

It was about nine fifteen at night, in the coldest part of the winter. It had snowed during the day, and there was ten inches of snow on the ground. We were sitting in the living room. Argie was listening to his battery-powered radio. We had no electricity or plumbing. We used kerosene lamps to light the house, and cooked on a wood stove. You hoped you didn't have to go to the bathroom after dark. Those old slop jars were hard to sit on and harder to empty. We heated the house with a big wood heater; Uncle Argie called it a pot-bellied stove, cause it was round in the middle. It warmed the living room real good, but the bedrooms were unheated. We used a lotta cover. Nothing felt better than going into a cold bedroom, and getting into a warm bed with hot bricks, wrapped in newspaper, at the foot. We'd heat the bricks on the potbellied stove, wrap them in newspaper and towels, to hold the heat. Then under the covers they'd go, to keep us warm at night. The security of a nice warm featherbed on a cold winter's night was one of my fondest childhood memories.

"Uncle Argie! Somebody's calling' you," I said. Argie didn't hear me he was listening to the war news. I said again," Uncle Argie somebody's calling you. "Bessie's was darning some sox when it got her attention. "What'd you say David? She asks. "David leave Argie alone, while he's listening to the news." said Mama. " Listen, " said Bessie, "I hear it to, Argie pay attention to this boy." Argie, turning his head to face me, said " what is it boy?" "I hear somebody calling' you," I said. Argie turned the radio off, the room got very quiet. A faint voice said "Argie, Argie Bates." Then there was silence for a long minute." Did you hear it, Uncle Argie?" I said. "Yes I did." There it is again. The voice was stronger this time. Argie, Argie Bates. We all got up and went to the front door. Argie went out on the front porch. Looking across the snow covered front yard; he began to call out helloooo.... Helloooo. We all stood there for a long minute, waiting for an answer. Nothing. There was nothing, no sound, nothing at all. Argie tried again helloooo....helloooo. Again we were met with silence. Mama said, "let's go back into the house, it's getting cold". We went in the house and Argie started getting ready to go look for the caller. Argie said 'boy get my gun". Yes Sir, and I went to the gun cabinet and got his 30-30 Marlin. Argie can I go? He looked at Mama. Will you watch after him? Of course. Mama shook her head. I began getting ready.

Argie! Argie Look! Argie looked at Bessie; she was pointing at the potbellied stove. Standing looking at us was a Ghost that's all I knew to call it. It was a shadowy transparent being. I ran and got behind Mama. I looked around Mama; it stood there for a long minute. Us looking at him, and him looking at us. Then it turned, and with its finger, scratched something on the side of the stove. We just stood there looking, nobody saying anything. Then it just went away, vanished. We stood there for a long minute, nobody said anything. Then Bessie said, "did anyone see what I saw"? Mama said, " I think we all did". Argie walked to the stove. It was too hot to touch; he leaned down and read what the Ghost had written. HELP ME! HELP ME!



Argie and I continued getting ready to go look for someone that might be stranded on the road. We put our coat and boots on, and got all bundled up. We started out the front door, when Mama said "Argie you better come look at this." We walked over to the stove where Mama was standing. She was pointing to the side of the stove. More writing had appeared. It said " GET THE ONE WHO KILLED ME. Bessie began to cry Mama held me close to her. It was then the house began to shake, and the windows rattle. A wind came through the house, and blew the lamps out, the room got very cold, and the darkness was black. I got closer to my Mother. She was shivering too. I said "Mama". "Be quiet," she said. To the left of the stove through the window, it lite up with a white misty glow, then there was a scene like a picture show. We could see two men fighting, next to a woodpile One man knocked the other into the pile, he came up with an axe and hit the other in the head. He fell to the ground, blood everywhere. The killer ran away leaving the axe in the man's head. Then the kerosene lamps flickered and came back on.
Bessie began to scream she was hysterical. She screamed and screamed until Uncle Argie slapped her. I looked into Mama face. She had almost no color. Her skin was cold, and she squeezed me so tight it hurt. Uncle Argie said "Heloise, Heloise"! She looked at him with a blank stare. She quietly said "Argie, I'm alright". Then she relaxed her grip, and I could breath easier. Everyone slept in the living room that night, by the pot bellied stove............with the writing on the side!

It was about six thirty when I woke up. It was cold the fire had gone out during the night. I looked around the room and saw Argie building a new fire, that gave me comfort. I pulled the blanket up around my neck, and tried to go back to sleep. It was no use, the thought of what happened last night scared me all over again. My eyes popped open, I had to get up. I walked straight to the stove. Argie said, "no boy, you didn't dream it". There on the side of the stove was the writing from last night. I had seen a ghost. Com'on boy les go look outside and see if we can find some tracks. We dressed and walked outside.




Standing on the porch we saw the sun coming up in the east. We looked the whole area over; there was not a mark in the snow. Argie told me it didn't snow last night, so if anybody had been there they would have left tracks. We began to walk in an ever-widening circle around the house, looking for some sign. Nothing. We walked around the barn across the road into Mr. Easterwoods pasture; we went half a mile in all directions. We never found anything. Argie told me not to say anything about what happened last night. He said people would call us crazy and laugh at us. Argie kept searching for some footprints; he didn't want to think the Ghost had called him.

In a little while we went in the house and had breakfast. Nobody had much to say while we ate, then Argie broke the silence and told Aunt Bessie and Mama what he told me. They agreed. Mama said she was going to go to the newspaper and look up old stories about murders around the early part of the century. Everyone was really upset about what had happened. Nobody wanted to tell anybody else cause they knew we'd be laughed at. So, Saturday we all went to town, and kept our mouth shut. Sept me, I told how somebody called Argie and nobody was there. Argie walked up when I was telling what happened, and stopped me. Then he had to explain what happened. When he told the story, keeping most of the facts to him self. He said someone called and we went out looking and couldn't find any tracks. The old-timers said that was the call of Death. Argie would die soon, they said. The last time I saw Uncle Argie he was 97 and in a rest home in a little town in Oklahoma.

A few weeks went by, and Mama couldn't wait any longer. She went to the news paper office and spent the whole day there. She got a lot of great information. We were sitting around the dinner table on a Sunday evening when Mama told what she found in the old newspapers. It seems that in 1901 the original owner of the house found his wife and a young man. A fight broke out. The two men fought through the house, out into the yard and by the woodpile. You know the rest. The killer was never caught; the wife whose name was Helena Marie went insane, seeing the murder was too much for her. She was standing at the window when her husband was killed. In the vision we could see the men's faces as plain as day. They were terrifying, the horror on the mans face when he saw the axe coming, and the fear in the other man's face when he realized what he'd done. Mama said she was going back to look deeper into the history of this old house.

It was hard for us to go to town, we had to hook up the team and ride in the back of an old wagon five miles to town. Argie wouldn't let the horses trot, said it wore'im out. So we sat in that wagon, feeling every rock for five miles. We started about five in the morning, so about seven we rolled into town. Lots of wagons were coming in at the same time, and the lady's began to gather and gossip. Argie and I took the horses around behind Mr. Wooten's Store. We unhooked'em and put'm in a small pasture, to graze. Then we started our walk. We walked up one side of the main drag and down the other, stopping to talk to all of Uncle Argie's buddies. While Argie was talking, I'd pull out an old pocketknife Argie had given me and clean my fingernails, showing off that knife. I cleaned my fingernails so much they got sore. Most of the kids didn't have a knife, kinda made me a big shot. Then Uncle Argie would ruin everything, and say, " boy put that knife up before you cut your self". Sure let the air out of my sails. Uncle Argie would go sit under the shade trees behind Wooten's store, and play dominoes. Me and the rest of the kids would go down to Bird Creek and take a swim. In the nude!

Mama went back to the news paper office to look up old papers, she had spent most of the day there when she saw something that shocked her! On the front page of the paper was a picture of the KILLER! The paper was about twenty years old, but the picture was as plain as day. The headlines read: CLUE GALLIGER ELECTED DISTRICT ATTORNEY, and twenty years later he was still District Attorney. Mother knew that Clue Galliger had murdered Rob Winslow, some forty odd years ago. Who would she tell, how would she tell people she knew? She knew he was the Killer, but could do nothing about it. She was heart broken. The ghost wanted his killer to be known, but there was no way to help him.


When we got home that night Mama talked to Argie and Bessie about what she had learned. Argie said he knew of Clue, and had never heard anything, but good about him. "It's hard to believe that would be in a man's past, a man of character like that." Said Argie. Mama said "if your doubting my word, look at this." She pulled a copy of the paper out of her purse. There in the paper was a picture of the man we had seen kill Rob Winslow. Bessie said." That's him, that's the face we saw in the window." "Sure is," said Argie. Mama said, " What are we going to do." I reckon there's nothing we can do." Said Argie. Mama said. "I'm going to get Brother Simpson to come see if he can free this house of the ghost.


A few days went by and Mama got word to Brother Simpson, that she needed to see him. Another week went by, and then one evening we heard horses and buggy outside, everyone went outside to see who it was. It was Brother Simpson, he said he'd been to Mr. Callie's house. Mr. Callie's mother was sick, and he went to look in on her. We went into the living room and sat around the potbellied stove. Mama began to tell the preacher about the ghost, but she didn't tell him about knowing who the murderer was. Mama showed him the writing on the side of the stove. Everyone was a little exited, and they all tried to talk at once. I didn't get to talk children or to be seen and not heard. That’s what Mama said. The Preacher settled everyone down, and asks how many saw the ghost. We all did! I think the Preacher was a little skeptical. He asked a lot of questions, than he said Preachers like him couldn't perform exorcisms, but he said he would Pray for the ghost to leave the house, and go to eternal rest. Rather than the torment of haunting this old house. He kinda said all this with a snicker in his voice. Boy was he in for a surprise.


We all joined hands in the middle of the room, and the Preacher began to Pray. He had prayed for about thirty seconds when the room got very cold, at that point the preacher eye's popped open, but he continued to Pray. Then just like before the house started to shake and the windows began to rattle the wind started to blow and blew the lamps out. Preacher changed his Prayer, and began to Pray for his own salvation. Then the window lit up with a white misty glow. Looked like a movie. I heard the Preacher say, Lord save my sole. I was holding the Preacher's left hand; he had such a grip on it he almost made me cry. He was shaking like a dog passing peach seeds. Through the window we could see the woodpile, and a chopping block with an axe in it. Then Rob Winslow appeared. The Preacher's shakes got more violent. I jerked my hand out of his. The glow from the window shined on his face, he looked more like a ghost than the ghost did. Then Rob Winslow walked to the chopping block and took the axe out of it with his left hand, and with his right hand he waved goodbye. Then the picture faded away, and the Preacher's butt hit the floor. As before the lamps came back on by themselves. The Preacher lay on the floor, sweating like a whore in church, even though the room was cold.


Mama and Bessie tried to revive the Preacher. He was out for about fifteen minutes, then began to come around. His first words "save me Jesus". Mama and Bessie got him into a chair. He continued to mumble Prayers for a while. Then he said, "We must not tell anybody what we saw tonight. We did see it didn't we?" It took us about an hour to get the Preacher on his way. Mama said she felt like Rob Winslow had found piece. We went to bed and got good nights sleep.


We got up early Saturday morning and went to town. When we got there the town was a buzz. The District Attorney had been murdered. It seems they found him in his bedroom with all the doors and windows locked. He was lying in bed, his hands held toward the ceiling, as if trying to keep someone away. He had a look of horror on his face, and an axe buried in his head!!!!!!! Nobody knew how Clue Galliger died, cept me and Mama, Argie and Bessie.


Author
D Mc